Samford Receives National Communication, Marketing Awards

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Samford University's Office of Marketing and Communication staff has received several awards in recent national competitions.

Samford received two Best of Class awards from the Religion Communicators Council during the organization's recent national convention in Indianapolis. Seasons, the university's primary news magazine, won Best of Class in the periodicals class. The magazine won the same award in 2009 and 2010.

Long-time Seasons editor William A. Nunnelley won Best in Class in the writing category for "Investing in a Life-Changing Experience." The special report in the magazine's September issue tackled the sensitive subject of how a private university deals with rising student debt and the need for more scholarship funding.

Samford contributed to a third Best in Class award, presented to The Alabama Baptist for its special issue on the one-year anniversary of the deadly April 2011 tornadoes across the state. Samford provided major funding and four pages of content for the special issue from the weekly publication of the Alabama Baptist Convention.

Award of Merit in writing to Nunnelley for"Reflecting on 1963," news coverage of a lecture by Pulitzer Prize-winning author Taylor Branch.

In addition to the RCC awards, Samford received seven awards in the annual Wilmer C. Fields Awards competition sponsored by Baptist Communicators Association. The awards were presented at the organization's recent annual convention in Little Rock, Ark.

The Bonhoeffer brochure won a first place award in the booklet category. The annual giving brochure featuring Isaiah Gresham won second place and the School of the Arts calendar won third place in the brochure category.

Other BCA awards were:

First place, social media category, to the multiple staff members who designed and manage the SamfordYOU social media site.

Third place, video news, (15 minutes or less) category, to Brad Radice, director of media relations, and David Rice, visual editor, for their Samford move-in day video news release.

Third place, booklets to Carter and Camp for Beeson Divinity School's fall convocation/meditation guide, "Love in the Ruins."

Religion Communicators Council, a 500-member interfaith group, was founded in 1929. It is the oldest professional communications/public relations organization in the U.S. The DeRose-Hinkhouse Memorial Awards have been given since the 1940s.

Baptist Communicators Association was founded in 1954 and has about 200 members who serve historically Baptist organizations. This was the 50th year for BCA's annual awards competition.

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About Samford University – Samford University is a premier nationally ranked private university deeply rooted in its Christian mission. Founded in 1841, Samford is the 87th oldest institution of higher education in the United States. U.S. News & World Report ranks Samford 4th among regional universities in the South. Samford enrolls 5,619 students from 44 states, the District of Columbia and 29 other countries in its 10 academic units: arts, arts and sciences, business, divinity, education, health professions, law, nursing, pharmacy, and public health. Samford also fields 17 NCAA Division I teams that compete in the tradition-rich Southern Conference.